tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post116499696870076697..comments2023-06-02T17:54:44.641+02:00Comments on Connaissances: French Particularities No. 11: MagicJonathan Wonhamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09862200571016427320noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-44700175893889029152009-02-12T00:42:00.000+01:002009-02-12T00:42:00.000+01:00Hi Karnikova. No problem. Happy particularising!Hi Karnikova. No problem. Happy particularising!Jonathan Wonhamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09862200571016427320noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-47973997578468783282009-02-11T10:13:00.000+01:002009-02-11T10:13:00.000+01:00one more comment from me :) i think i will use you...one more comment from me :) i think i will use your idea of "particularities" if you don't mind. My blog, among other themes, talks about Zagreb as well and I think it is a great idea to write about these particularities. Would you mind me using your idea?<BR/>bbyeKarnikovahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06903205415842251051noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1166397962121885392006-12-18T00:26:00.000+01:002006-12-18T00:26:00.000+01:00Well, it's precisely analagous to your child-deve...Well, it's precisely analagous to your child-development theory, which I agree with, by the way. It's about how you control, or give meaning to, a random universe. Myth serves the same function.<BR/><BR/>Yeats was WAY into this stuff. As was, of course, Ted Hughes.Ms Baroquehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01836227454899083962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1166393503191548862006-12-17T23:11:00.000+01:002006-12-17T23:11:00.000+01:00Hello Ms Baroque, thanks for your comment.This is ...Hello Ms Baroque, thanks for your comment.<BR/><BR/>This is an aspect of magic I hadn't really thought about, I mean the supernatural realm. Wasn't Yeats quite a believer in this sort of thing, around the same sort of time I suppose.<BR/><BR/>I do think that magic in this sense is a sort of escapism - from the realities of war or whatever. When external order breaks down, humans go inside themselves to create new imaginative rules and order, or to try and make themselves feel more powerful in a world in which they feel powerless.Jonathan Wonhamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09862200571016427320noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1166356243934373992006-12-17T12:50:00.000+01:002006-12-17T12:50:00.000+01:00Cottingley, I mean!Cottingley, I mean!Ms Baroquehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01836227454899083962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1166356170091324152006-12-17T12:49:00.000+01:002006-12-17T12:49:00.000+01:00This is really interesting and of course it is wel...This is really interesting and of course it is well known that these matters suit the Romantic imagination far better than the phlegmatic Anglo-Saxon one. The origins of magic in the development of the child explain why everyone still has a little of it in them.<BR/><BR/>There was an interesting popular-culture treatment of some of these ideas a few years back, with that film <I>Fairy Tale: a True Story</I>. The story relates to those two girls who claimed to have photographs of real fairies at the bottom of their garden - the incident is well known as the Coppingley Fairies. But the film, placing the story firmly in the context of the Great War, gives our human need for magic its due. Arthur Conan Doyle (himself bereaved of a son) made the two girls & their fairies famous, and is allied in the film with Harry Houdini (himself a mode of your model 1), played by Harvey Keitel. <BR/><BR/>I love your photograph, too.Ms Baroquehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01836227454899083962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1165518086007298282006-12-07T20:01:00.000+01:002006-12-07T20:01:00.000+01:00Thank you Joe. This made me laugh. I think poets a...Thank you Joe. This made me laugh. I think poets are probably supposed to prefer the first kind of magic and, therefore, end up rather less healthy.<BR/><BR/>This is the book in more detail:<BR/><BR/>L'ENCHANTEMENT LITTERAIRE- ECITURE ET MAGIE DE CHATEAUBRIAND A RIMBAUD<BR/><BR/>AUTEUR: VADE Y.<BR/>Published by GALLIMARD in 1990.<BR/><BR/>It's in French and, I would say, rather hard work if you're not fluent. I'll try and see the film. I think it is still on general release here in France.Jonathan Wonhamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09862200571016427320noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7083730.post-1165508553446893982006-12-07T17:22:00.000+01:002006-12-07T17:22:00.000+01:00Is this book in French? I'd be interested to take...Is this book in French? I'd be interested to take a look. Has the movie _The Prestige_ made its way across seas? Really lovely new film which encapsulates a philosophy of magic.<BR/> The goodwilled audience that enjoys threadbare magic seems a healthy bunch. (les non dupes errant)Joe Milutishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06191182544676824308noreply@blogger.com